Kagato's Resurrection
by Tenchi-sama1
Summary: Ok, chapter two's done. Its a bit shorter, but I think it flows better. Anyway, there it is, R&R if you feel like it. ^^ (see the little nuku nuku eyes?)
1. Kagato's Rise

Disclaimer: I do not own any of the characters used in this fanfic. They are the property of the Pioneer company, as well as a bunch of other rich people, whom I would really like to avoid a conflict with. I'm not making a cent off this fic, so please don't sue me.

Ryoko set down her newly emptied sake cup and exhaled heavily. "Lishn, Ayeka," she slurred. "I'm gonna tell you once more. I'm sick 'a you always hanging around _my_ Tenchi. So just stay away from him."

"Oh, he's _your _Tenchi, is he?" sneered the equally intoxicated princess. "Well let me ask you something. If he's _your _Tenchi, why does he cringe whenever you touch him?"

Ryoko tried to wade through the alcohol induced mists, but was unable to come up with any response more intelligent than, "Shut up! Screw you, Ayeka!"

"Just what one would expect from a third class, unrefined pirate like you."

Ryoko felt her blood pressure rising. She would have attacked the prissy princess right then and there, but she wasn't exactly at the top of her game at the moment. She decided to wait for her chance to retaliate. "I don' need this," she said, and promptly dematerialized."

"That's right, run away," said Ayeka, opening another bottle.

Ryoko didn't have any particular destination in mind when she teleported away from Ayeka. She wasn't in the mood to deal with Ayeka's crap, and she just wanted to get away from her undue cruelty. She found herself amidst a jumble of machines that she took to be Washu's lab. She stumbled through the clutter, a difficult task even while sober, and finally collapsed amongst a pile of dead equipment. "Damn it, Washu, move yer junk...snnxxxx..."

A bright green subspace monitor, similar to the ones Washu was fond of using, blossomed into being next to Ryoko. Lines of code began running across the screen, culminating in the words "preliminary reestablishment program commenced". A thin beam of green light flickered from the screen and touched Ryoko's forehead. The sleeping woman twitched lightly and a small moan escaped her lips.

* * *

Tenchi sat up and stretched, rubbing the sleep out of his eyes. "That's weird," he mumbled. Usually he awoke to find Ryoko hovering above him. This was traditionally followed by her yelling "Tenchi!" and glomping him, and his being rather irritated with the whole thing. Today, though, he felt strangely disappointed that she wasn't there. *What am I thinking?" he asked himself. *Must not have gotten enough sleep. What time is it, anyway?* He rolled over and looked at the clock on his nightstand. "Oh, crap!" he yelled, realizing that he was half an hour late for his chores. He dressed hurriedly and ran up the stairs to the shrine.

"You're late, Tenchi," Katsuhito commented as Tenchi crested the stairs.

"Sorry," he replied, breathing heavily. By way of explanation, he added, "Overslept." Tenchi grabbed the broom from where it rested on the wall of the shrine and began sweeping.

"And why is that?"

"Well, Ryoko didn't wake me up this morning and--" Tenchi mentally kicked himself for saying this. Katsuhito may have been wise, but he also had a slightly hentai sense of humor.

"Tenchi," replied the old priest seriously, "is there something you want to tell me? Perhaps your relationship with Ryoko is different than with the others, hmm?"

"Grandpa, you know that's not what I meant." Tenchi searched for a subject to quell his grandfather's chuckling. *C'mon, something, anything.* "Have you seen Ryoko around?" *Okay, anything but that. Smooth, Tenchi.*

Katsuhito's mirth slowly subsided. "No, I haven't seen her. You might try the house, though."

"Right," said Tenchi, starting toward the house.

"After you finish your chores," finished Katsuhito.

"Oh, yeah..."

* * *

Tenchi hurried through his chores and jogged all the way back to the house. There was an anxiousness about him that he couldn't quite explain. *You're worried about Ryoko.* he told himself.

*That's ridiculous. Ryoko's probably just goofing off somewhere.*

*What could she possibly be doing that would take precedence over groping you?*

Tenchi was getting the distinct impression that he was loosing this argument. *Well what's wrong with being worried? She gets in trouble enough. Anyway, I'd be worried about any of the girls.*

*Why were you embarrassed to talk about it in front of Katsuhito then?*

"I just need some food," Tenchi decided aloud, trying to dispel the strangely logical voice within him. "Everything will look better after breakfast."

Loud snores greeted him as he walked through the doors into the living room. *Ah, there she is.* "Ryoko, time to--"

It was not Ryoko he found, but Ayeka, sprawled out on the floor amidst a sea of empty sake bottles, snoring for all she was worth. "Aw, man..." sighed Tenchi, picking up several of the bottles.

"Tenchi, is that you?" came Sasami's voice from the kitchen.

"Yeah. Sorry I'm late. Anything left?"

"Hey, don't worry about it, I saved you some."

"Thanks." He took an arm full of bottles into the kitchen and placed them in a large garbage bag. He grabbed the bowl of miso soup Sasami had saved for him and began eating. The snores emanating from the next room suddenly stopped. "Be right back," said Tenchi, filling a large glass with water and heading into the living room.

"Oh, Tsunami, my _head_!" moaned the princess, opening her eyes slowly. "Lord Tenchi!" she exclaimed, suddenly noticing him, then looking dismayed as she realized where she was. "Oh, dear. Here, let me clean this, Tenchi." She struggled to get to her feet, then promptly collapsed on the couch as the room spun around her.

"Here," Tenchi said, offering her the water. "This will help. I'll clean up."

She started to object, but then decided to just accept the water. The sound of her own voice only served to amplify the already incredible pain inside her head.

Tenchi took another load of bottles into the kitchen, filled another glass, and returned to the living room. Ayeka gave him the empty glass and he handed her the full one. "Looks like you had fun," he observed.

Ayeka blushed slightly. "Yes, well, Ryoko and I were having a drink," Tenchi glanced up quickly at Ryoko's name, but he quickly returned to tidying. "And we...we had a rather frank exchange of views."

"What happened after that?"

"She disappeared."

"Did she say where she was going?"

"No, she wasn't in the best of moods." A long pause followed this statement. Finally, Tenchi broke the silence.

"Would you like some soup?"

"No thank you, just some more water, if its not too much trouble."

"Sure." Tenchi smiled as he took her glass and headed for the kitchen, but the smile faded as soon as he turned away from the princess. Breakfast hadn't helped, and the conversation he had just had with Ayeka only served to amplify his worry.

* * *

Deep in the recesses of Washu's lab, Ryoko lay hovering above the now functioning machinery, surrounded in a green energy field. The beam of light issuing from the subspace monitor had widened and was punctuated now and then with larger spheres of light, which disappeared as they made contact with Ryoko's forehead.

Ryoko's eyes snapped open. She was standing in the middle of a large, circular platform, but she couldn't remember how she got there. The last thing that she remembered was passing out it Washu's lab. *Oh, well. At least I don't have a hangover.*

"Time to go," she said, only to find that she was unable to teleport out. "That's odd. Guess I'll just have to fly out." She ascended rapidly, then stopped as she forcefully encountered an almost invisible green force shield. "Jeeze, where am I?" she wondered aloud. She gathered an energy sphere into her hand and slammed it into the shield, then screamed and grasped her head as she plummeted to the ground.

"There's a feedback loop, Ryoko. I wouldn't try that if I were you."

* * *

"Image training?" asked Tenchi. "What's that?"

"Image training is the art of using an energy source to solidify a psychic bond," explained Katsuhito. "In this case, the energy source is the gems in Tenchi-ken. The link is then used to allow the two subjects to engage in combat without danger of serious injury. It will also allow me to monitor your brain waves and reactions to certain stimuli. I can use that knowledge to help you in your training."

"Sounds good. How do I begin?"

"Focus your Jurai energy onto Tenchi-ken. At the same time, envision yourself in our training grounds. I will do the rest."

Tenchi closed his eyes and breathed deeply. He envisioned himself in the middle of the familiar clearing with his bokken held before him. He looked around for his grandfather, but Katsuhito was nowhere to be found, and everything beyond the clearing was obscured by what looked like very thick fog. *What do I do now?*

"**Prepare yourself**" came Katsuhito's voice from all directions. Tenchi shifted to a defensive posture and reached out with the Jurai energy in an attempt to sense where his enemy was. A slight shift in the energy behind him warned him of his grandfather's approach. He spun around and braced for the attack, but no one was there.

"**That is not the way, Tenchi. You are letting your emotions take control. Focus!**"

Tenchi breathed deeply and focused on achieving the void. There were no emotions, only his body, and his sword was an extension of his body. He reached out again, but this time when he sensed Katsuhito's attack he did not tense. Instead, he spun and deflected the attack, then quickly followed with one of his own. His sword did not score a hit, but the older man retreated into the fog all the same. The attack came again, and again, each time stronger and faster, and each time it took a little more for Tenchi to rid himself of his grandfather.

Finally the attacks ceased. "**Very good, Tenchi.**" came Katsuhito's voice. "**Are you ready for the next level?**"

Without bothering to wait for Tenchi's reply, the fog enveloping the clearing began to move in closer, encircling Tenchi, leaving him only a few feet in which to move. Then it burst into flames.

"What the hell?!?!" exclaimed Tenchi, backing into the flames. "OW! How can this hurt?"

"**Your mind believes it will, so it sends those impulses to your body. Now, are you ready?**"

Tenchi reassumed his defensive posture, but before he could try and sense an attack, bright green bolts of energy shot through the space around him.

"What now?" he called out to his grandfather.

"**I don't know. There is a foreign energy. I am breaking the bond.**"

Before Katsuhito could act on this promise, however, one of the energy bolts struck Tenchi in the chest.

* * *

Next to Ryoko's prostrate form, a new monitor appeared. Glyphs flashed across the screen, "Gem control and re-fusion commencing".

Ryoko lay on the platform, eyes closed. "No, that's impossible, it can't be, it can't be..."

"You're right," replied the man hovering above her. "I'm not Kagato, but I am a remarkably good replica, don't you think? In truth I'm just a program designed to bring you back to him should you ever get free."

"Kagato is dead!" cried Ryoko. "And that means you have no reason to exist!" She summoned all the energy at her disposal and blasted it at Kagato. "DIE!!!"

He simply waited, allowing the energy to hit him. And pass right through him. The energy connected with the barrier around them, sending inconceivable waves of pain through Ryoko. She was unable to scream as her body convulsed in agony.

"Don't you understand the concept of a feedback loop, Ryoko?" asked Kagato. "Anyway, I'm being powered by your energy. You can't hurt me. Feel free to keep trying, though."

"I...won't let you," gasped Ryoko, barely able to force the words out.

Kagato began laughing, a sound that threatened to drive Ryoko insane with rage. "How do you plan to stop me? Once the gems return, I'll have complete control."

Ryoko pushed away her pain. She might not be able to teleport out of the shield, but she could probably teleport inside of it. And just because she couldn't hit Kagato with energy didn't mean her fist would be the same.

She tested these theories by teleporting behind Kagato and delivering to his back a kick that would have killed an elephant. She smiled as the gray haired man went flying to the ground. He rose unsteadily to his feet. She was determined not to let him get in an attack. Before he could get his bearings, she teleported above him and smashed her elbow into the crown of his head. His knees buckled and he collapsed again. He rolled over and shot an energy blast at her. She dodged by reflex, then realized her mistake. Kagato smiled as her screams echoed around them. He rose into the air above the motionless Ryoko. "Nice try, Ryoko. But you're only a waste product, after all."

The barrier surrounding the platform began solidifying. "Remember, Ryoko? Remember what it is to be a prisoner in your own mind?"

* * *

The first thing Tenchi saw when he opened his eyes was the master key engulfed in a green aura, floating a few feet off the ground. Bursts of electricity licked the gems, which were now a dull green as well. Suddenly, the gems disappeared from the hilt. The aura dispersed, and the sword began to drop. Tenchi caught it before it could touch the ground.

"Ryoko." When the energy beam had hit him, he had felt a piece of his mind being pulled away. He could see in his mind's eye what he knew to be Ryoko's mindscape just as he had seen his own while training. He saw the cyan haired woman lying on the ground with Kagato hovering over her, laughing. He ignited Tenchi-ken and started running toward the house.

* * *

"Can you feel the gems returning, Ryoko? This power is incredible!" Kagato began to laugh.

"Tenchi!" For a moment, Ryoko saw a ghostlike Tenchi just beyond the ever darkening shield. He looked angry.

"What's a Tenchi?" asked Kagato incredulously.

"Please hurry, Tenchi," Ryoko whispered. The barrier was filtering out light now, becoming opaque.

"Well, I'd love to stay and chat, but I can't control your body from inside this cage. Ja ne, Ryoko," were the last words she heard him say before floating through the now black dome surrounding her.

* * *

The image in Tenchi's mind hadn't faded as he ran toward the house. If anything, it had grown in clarity. He saw the look on Ryoko's face as the sphere around her darkened, watched Kagato as he floated out of the sphere and began transforming her mindscape from a bright white into a dank gray. Tenchi's blood was pounding in his ears. He didn't particularly care how Kagato got there, but, he thought, *He made a big mistake messing with my Ryoko.* Jurai energy was coming off of him in waves now, and he made no effort to control it. He grabbed the shoji and flung it to the side, derailing it in the process.

"Lord Tenchi, I...ahh!" Ayeka gasped and stepped back as Tenchi stormed into the room. She had never felt Tenchi channel this much energy without the Lighthawk Wings.

Tenchi, for his part, didn't even acknowledge the princess's presence. He stepped right past her and approached the door to Washu's lab. "Washu!" he yelled at the top of his lungs. No response seemed forthcoming, so he slashed at the door with Tenchi-ken. The blade bounced off with no effect on the door. Tenchi growled and powered down the blade, then began to increase his own aura. It expanded until it was engulfing the house, shaking the building on it's foundation. Tenchi drew back his hand and slammed his palm into the door, using all the energy available to him. The door flew off whatever had been holding it in place and crashed into the far wall.

He stepped in and looked around for Washu. The small scientist was rubbing the sleep out of her eyes, obviously having just been awoken by the crashing of the door against the wall.

"Washu!"

Washu blinked and looked around. "Wha?" Her eyes snapped open at the sight of Tenchi engulfed in energy. "Lord Tenchi?! What's wrong?"

"Where is Ryoko?"

* * *

Ryoko lay curled up in the fetal position on the floor of her prison. For so long Kagato had kept her in this same mental cage, forcing her to watch the atrocities he was committing with her body. When she had finally escaped Kagato's influence, she had been locked up again, this time in that cave. Seven hundred years later, Tenchi freed her and she had felt so good. But now she was back, enveloped in darkness.

A small bit of light broke through the shield. Ryoko looked up, horrified to discover that the dark dome above her had turned into a screen through which she could see everything her physical eyes could. She watched as her body stood up, unable to control it. "Tenchi, help me!" she cried in desperation.

* * *

"What do you mean you don't know?!" Tenchi demanded angrily. "I thought you had a mental link." Suddenly Ryoko's voice rang out in his head. *Tenchi, help me!*

"She needs our help!" he insisted, the anger now replaced with worry.

"I'm sorry, I'm working as fast...wait. I'm picking up some odd energy surges deep in the lab. They appear to be Ryoko's."

Tenchi raised his sword and once again willed the blue blade into being. "Lead the way, little Washu."

"Gladly," replied the diminutive genius. She punched something into her keyboard and a large glowing purple disc shimmered into being above the floor. She stepped on it and disappeared. Tenchi followed.

They rematerialized in a scene of utter chaos. Ryoko, surrounded by an intense energy aura, was destroying everything around them. Washu pointed excitedly to a small monitor.

"That's a synaptic resequencer!" She had to shout to be heard over the din. "That's not our Ryoko!"

"I know!" Tenchi yelled back. "Look!" Washu followed his pointing finger to Ryoko's wrists. Bright points of green were there, where the red gems would have been. "And her eyes!" Rather than their usual gold, her eyes had also become green.

Ryoko turned to face them.

"Uh oh..."

* * *

Ryoko watched as her body destroyed the machines around her. It wasn't so much that she cared about the machines, but the hated what she was doing because she couldn't control herself. Suddenly there was a bright purple flash, and Washu and Tenchi were there.

"Tenchi!" gasped Ryoko, stunned. She was amazed to see this much energy in Tenchi's battle aura.

Ryoko could see Tenchi and Washu talking, but she couldn't make out what they were saying over the explosions. She hoped they knew she wasn't in control.

Her body turned to face Tenchi.

"So this is Tenchi, eh?" Kagato's voice came from all around her. "What to do, what to do. That's clearly Jurai energy, so I'd say...he dies."

"No!" Ryoko pleaded. "You can't! Please!" 

"Uh oh..." came Tenchi's voice.

Ryoko saw her arm raise, watched as the energy gathered in it.

* * *

Tenchi raised his sword to deflect the energy blast. Instead of deflecting it, however, Tenchi-ken detonated the energy bomb, sending both he and Washu flying back. Tenchi shifted his weight so his head was facing down. Just before he hit the ground he shot out his arm, vaulting up and completing the flip. He grabbed Washu just before she hit the back wall.

He threw Washu to the right and jumped to the left, throwing himself to the side to avoid another blast. Tenchi was quickly realizing that he probably couldn't do this with Tenchi-ken alone. He heard the familiar sound of Ryoko rematerializing above him.

*Above? No time!*

Ryoko's red blade cut a swath in the air, curving toward Tenchi's face. Bringing Tenchi-ken up to deflect would be futile, he knew, because he lacked the speed and the strength to block her swing. *Not Ryoko,* he reminded himself. *Kagato.* In his mind, he saw the gray haired man laugh with delight at Ryoko's mental screams.

*How dare he!*

The Lighthawk wings blazed into being in front of Tenchi, stopping Ryoko's sword an inch from his face then tossing the woman backward like a rag doll. She slammed against the far wall, creating a massive dent.

Tenchi stretched out his arms, willing the energy to change forms. He winced as the wings covered his arms and upper body in the weightless armor that had stopped Kagato's sword on the Soja. He grasped the base of the third wing and watched as it formed a sword as indestructible as Tsunami.

A battle cry alerted him of Ryoko's presence behind him. He spun around and brought his arm up to block her saber, his own sword dissipating and reforming as a shield over his arm. Ryoko began an all out assault, throwing energy bombs, punches, and slashing at him with her sword, but with the Lighthawk energy augmenting his abilities, he matched her blow for blow. The insignia on his forehead glowed intensely, and Tenchi was showing no signs of fatigue.

Finally he backed her up against a wall, covered his hands in shield energy, grasped her sword and squeezed. The energy blinked out of existence while his own sword reformed in his hand, the tip facing Ryoko.

She smiled and held her hands up in a gesture of surrender. "You wouldn't hit a girl, now, would you Tenchi?" she asked coyly.

Tenchi's sword and determination wavered at hearing her say his name like that. The insignia dimmed.

Ryoko brought her arms down and unleashed a torrent of energy, blasting a crater where Tenchi was milliseconds before.

Tenchi spun to the side and brought his sword down in a chopping motion, loping off both of Ryoko's hands just above the gems.

She stared dumbly at the stumps, then at the pile of ashes that had been her hands only moments before. She gave Tenchi a look of anguish before disappearing.

The wings evaporated as Tenchi fell to the floor, his face mirroring the look that Ryoko had given him before dematerializing. Washu rushed over to him.

"Lord Tenchi, are you okay?" She quickly brought up a subspace monitor and started typing furiously, checking his vital signs.

"I hurt her," he said weakly. "I didn't want to, but I did. How could I do that to her?"

"You had no choice. She was trying to kill you."

"No, she wasn't. That was Kagato. I can hear him..."

Washu paused, then looked up at Tenchi. "You can what now?"

"I can hear him. He's yelling at her for being weak. That bastard!"

Washu looked at her monitor again. "So that's it. Tenchi, you say you can hear him. Is there anything else out of the ordinary?"

"I can see something...I think it might be Ryoko's mindscape."

"Well that accounts for the unusual synaptic activity. Tenchi, you seem to be linked to Ryoko's mind. I can't say how, but Ryoko's brainwaves are in your head, in addition to your own."

"So?" asked Tenchi, emotionally dead.

"So Kagato only exists in Ryoko's mind. If you have a link, you might be able to defeat Kagato."

"But wouldn't Ryoko have tried that?"

"Sure, but it wouldn't have done any good. Kagato's program would be powered by her, so she couldn't hurt him."

Tenchi thought on this for a while. Finally he nodded. "What must I do?"

* * *

"You weakling! How could you possibly fail to defeat a worthless _Juraian_?" Flecks of spittle were flying out of Kagato's mouth as he raged. "A _Juraian_! You killed thousands of them on Jurai! Their best warriors and kings fell before you, yet you cannot defeat this _child_!?"

"He's not just any Juraian," Ryoko stated simply. She struggled not to smile, for in this mood Kagato was likely to hurt her as a vent for his frustrations. "And besides, it wasn't me, it was you."

That was the wrong thing to say. Kagato immediately flew down and kicked her in the side. Hard. She flew several feet before hitting the barrier and falling to the ground.

"Well this time, I won't make the mistake of holding back."


	2. Kagato's Defeat

Disclaimer: Don't you just love that word? "Disclaimer"...a way to separate one's self from blame while still taking credit. This appeals to my more my more carefree and blame-fleeing side. Anyway, I am in no way affiliated with Pioneer or any others who own Tenchi, nor have I been, and probably never will be. Too bad about that....and now, without too much further ado, I present chapter two of my fic. Please enjoy, review, and if at any time you feel the need to be refreshed, the snack bar and restrooms are located there. ^_^

Washu carefully inserted the 2 gems into place on the makeshift headset she had just assembled. "Now this should boost your link enough to let you project a presence in Ryoko's mindscape as strong as her own. That will allow you to do battle with Kagato. The rest is up to you."

"Is there anything that could go wrong?"

"Well, this isn't as efficient as if Ryoko were wearing the gems, so the power output might not be sufficient. If that were the case, your neural patterns would be stuck in Ryoko's body, or deleted altogether. But both of them are fairly remote chances. There's a good sixty-five percent chance that you won't notice any side effects."

"Well that's reassuring," said Tenchi, looking anything but reassured.

"Just concentrate on her mindscape. I'll be monitoring things on this end."

"Wish me luck." Tenchi focused his mind solely on Ryoko's. He noticed that the bubble encircling Ryoko had become transparent after she lost the two gems. Just transparent enough, in fact, to see Kagato kicking Ryoko.

Tenchi's eyes narrowed. He focused his Jurai energy into a single ball and released it toward the energy sphere surrounding Ryoko. Tenchi's attack punched a hole big enough to walk through on both sides of the shield.

"What the--" Kagato's exclamation was cut short as Tenchi followed his blast through the shield and delivered a Jurai powered punch to Kagato's jaw, knocking the bigger man out of the bubble.

"Ryoko, are you okay?" Tenchi's gaze was filled with a concern Ryoko rarely found there. Despite the severity of the situation, she couldn't resist jumping up and kissing him. It only lasted a moment, but when Ryoko broke the kiss it looked as if Tenchi's brain was starved for oxygen. He seemed to not quite be able to get his bearings.

"Whoa..." was the first thing Tenchi could think to say.

"Get him, Tenchi."

After that kiss, Tenchi had some trouble wrenching his attention back the battle. Nevertheless, his attention was forcefully drawn back to Kagato as an energy blast narrowly missed him.

Tenchi jumped out of now porous energy bubble and faced Kagato. A thin line of green was running from the older man's mouth where Tenchi had hit him. Tenchi-ken's blade sprang to life.

Kagato's wore an obvious expression of disgust as he looked at the young man. "I don't know how you got in here, boy, but I'll make sure you don't get out again."

"Shove it." Tenchi remembered what had happened the last time he had challenged Kagato in this fashion. The older man had stopped his sword effortlessly, and Tenchi had been forced to bring up the Lighthawk wings to destroy him. But he wouldn't make the same mistakes this time. Katsuhito had taught him how to control the master key, how to use it to harness his hidden Jurai power. Tenchi rubbed the ring that Tsunami had given him and was immediately clad in Juraian armor.

Kagato growled and disappeared.

"What?" Tenchi looked around in a panic, then realized too late that Kagato was behind him. He heard an energy sword moving toward him. Tenchi powered down Tenchi-ken and used it to erect an energy barrier behind him. He spun around to face his opponent.

There was a swishing sound and suddenly Kagato was knocked back, his sword gone. Tenchi looked to his left. "Ryoko?"

The cyan haired woman smiled at him. "You didn't think I was going to let you do this alone, did you?"

Tenchi shrugged and once again took up a fighting stance facing Kagato. Ryoko stood beside him, sword at the ready. Tenchi's aura began to expand.

Kagato rose to his feet and considered them. "I hate to do this, really I do, but you leave me no choice." This said, he began removing his clothing.

"What the hell?!" Ryoko cried, aiming a kick at his head. "We don't want to see that!"

"You won't have to." As his clothing fell away, he revealed...nothing. No trace of the man could be seen. They both fell silent, the only audible sound being that of Kagato's cape whispering as it fell to the ground.

Tenchi and Ryoko unconsciously backed toward each other, both glancing around uneasily. 

And then the barrage began.

* * *

Washu reclined on her pillow, another immediately floating in to cushion her back. She took a hand full of popcorn from the bag next to her and crunched on it contentedly. She was quite glad she had been possessed of the foresight to hook up her giant-screen holo-projector to the apparatus that was projecting Tenchi's brain waves into Ryoko. 

However, being the greatest and most prominent genius in the universe, it would not be proper to merely watch as Tenchi and Ryoko bravely batted against Kagato. Nay, she was at this very moment typing up a summary and marketing strategy for this headset with her spare hand. Multi-tasking had always been a specialty of hers. 

"...revolutionize the field of interrogation as we know it. Using specially designed synaptic enhancers, it utilizes previously unrecorded frequencies of light rays to project the thoughts of one being into the mind of another. No longer will cross-species telepsychosis be a risk of mind probing! With this oh my God!! Where did he go???"

Her hand unconsciously followed her train of thought as she watched Kagato, projected as hundreds of feet tall, simply vanish. With the enhanced detail, the fear and confusion on the faces of Tenchi and her daughter were painfully obvious. Equally obvious was their helplessness as they were pummeled from all sides by their invisible foe.

Washu abandoned her synopsis of the headset and ran to check the item itself, as well as the wearer. Tenchi was violently convulsing, his spasms exactly matching the timing of Kagato's hits. She quickly scanned him. 

"Lord Tenchi....oh my...." Tenchi's nervous system was registering the beating. His heart beat and adrenaline levels were rising at an alarming rate. Blood was being siphoned off from unnecessary areas of the body and flooding his muscles. More alarmingly, his brain was simulating the effects of the blows to his body, slowly disabling him.

*If this doesn't stop soon,* Washu realized, *Tenchi will die!*

* * *

Blow after blow rained down upon Tenchi. The speed and power were astonishing, and over and over he barely had time to raise Tenchi-ken before another blow threw his balance off. He looked over and saw Ryoko receiving a similar thrashing. "Ryoko!" he cried out, the Lighthawk energy beginning to flood his body. He held out his hands, but was knocked to the ground before he could summon the wings. An invisible kick to the diaphragm left him unable to breathe, and the power quickly abandoned him.

Ryoko, for her part, was using what meager defensive skills she possessed to erect a force shield around her. It did very little, if anything at all. She crouched into a defensive position, her arms covering her more vital areas. Hearing her name called, she turned and saw Tenchi, apparently trying to summon the wings. She gasped as he was knocked to the ground and Tenchi-ken slid out of his grasp. He doubled over in pain, gasping.

She lunged for the sword hilt, her fingers closing upon the carved wood. She raised her hand to throw it back to Tenchi when blue electricity engulfed her, eliciting another scream as her flesh smoked. The weapon dropped from her hand, clattering on the ground, as she did likewise.

Kagato's clothing rose from the ground and garbed its unseen host. The face was the last aspect to appear, flickering into being like a holo-projection. The gray haired man smiled sardonically at the two moaning, prostrate forms. 

* * *

Washu cursed violently in all the languages she knew. Millennia ago she had faced a similar problem, when a virus had taken over an android of her creation and razed half of the Science Academy. All of its anti-virus software had been crushed, her hacking skills had not been sufficient to rout the bug, and there was no time for other options. The android had to be destroyed. She knew Ryoko's destructive potential vastly surpassed that of the android, and she couldn't allow Kagato to control that force. A solitary tear flowed down her cheek.

*Dammit, Tenchi, get up. Get up!*

* * *

Tenchi gagged as he tried to force air into his lungs. They seemed unwilling, though his body screamed at him, a resonating cry for the necessity of oxygen. Finally he coughed and sucked in a cool mouthful of the precious gas. More quickly followed, and his thought process was slowly turned away from the need for air and toward the need to deal with Kagato. 

He raised his eyes, more out of instinct than purpose, and once again beheld the gray haired man.

"Bastard!" spat Tenchi, forcing himself to stand.

"Really, is vulgarity such a necessity?" Kagato asked in a condescending tone, his cruel smile remaining.

Tenchi looked around frantically for his weapon. He spotted it next to Ryoko, and ran toward it. *Gotta beat him.....gotta kill him....my responsibility...* His hand wrapped around the hilt, and the blade sprang once again from its resting place. 

Kagato raised his hand, summoning his own blade, a shimmering green against Tenchi's bright blue.

The Jurain boy screamed and charged at the older man, slashing blindly. The swords collided, parted, collided again. Defense was lost to Tenchi; his only focus was destruction. The best defense, he reminded himself, was often a superior offense. And his wager was paying off handsomely. Kagato was driven back and back, his sword searing the air around Tenchi, but never touching him. The cruel grin Kagato had worn was absent from the older man's countenance, but was slowly spreading on the youth's face. In what was left of his conscious mind, he was aware of a desire to kill, to tear, to vivisect.

His emotions reached fever pitch; he must protect Ryoko. He felt the energy once again moving through his body, and his hands stretched to allow it an outlet.

"Lighthawk wings, Tenchi?" Kagato laughed. "A very good idea, as a single blow will destroy my program...but it will also destroy Ryoko's mind."

Tenchi hesitated for a moment.

"Oh, yes, didn't you realize? The offensive power of those wings is incredible. They can destroy almost anything tangible, and in this situation, a mindscape is very tangible."

The youth struggled to comprehend: he had almost killed Ryoko, with the intention of saving her.

"And now, my dear boy," Kagato continued, discreetly forming a second sword behind his back, "you will pay for your indecision."

Tenchi-ken's blade cut a swath in the air, easily blocking Kagato's primary blade, but Tenchi was completely unprepared for the secondary blade, which severed his left arm just above the elbow, cauterizing the wound on contact. Tenchi stared dumbly at the stump.

Kagato's swords came down in a parallel arc, aiming at the boy's head. Tenchi brought up his blade with all the speed and strength he could muster, pushing it, willing it to stop Kagato's advancing weapons. The sound of energy hitting energy exploded into the air, and the gray haired man's swords did indeed stop, for a moment. But slowly, inexorably, they bore down upon Tenchi, and he was unable to summon the strength to stop them. He could feel their heat against his skin, and he could hear Kagato laughing, laughing....

Then the pressure stopped. His sword sliced through the now yielding air, for the older man's blades had disappeared. Kagato's hands had gone to his throat, where Ryoko's arm was wrapped around it, cutting off his air.

"Kagato sure knew how to make a life-like program," she quipped. "It even responds to a lack of air." She nodded to Tenchi.

The young man approached Kagato, whose lips were now blue-tinged. "For all you did," were the last words Tenchi uttered before his sword swung at the older man, cutting him in half. And again. And again. And yet again.

Ryoko coldly surveyed what remained of Kagato, then spat on it. The pieces slowly shimmered, then dispersed into the air. The imprisoning bubble followed suit, and the surrounding mindscape faded from gray to a bright white once more. She glanced up at the sharp clattering sound of Tenchi-ken slipping from its master's fingers to the ground.

"Tenchi!" she cried, closing the short distance between them. "Tenchi..." her eyes rested on his stump of an arm.

"Are you alright Ryoko?" She looked up, once again finding the concern for her well-being in his eyes.

"Of course I'm alright, but your arm--"

"Then it was worth it." His remaining arm slid around her waist and pulled her toward him. His head brushed the side of hers, his lips lowering to her ear. "Ryoko," he whispered, "I...I lo--"

"Sorry to break up the romantic moment," came Washu's voice from all around. The couple jumped visibly.

"Jeeze, Washu! What's the big idea?!" Ryoko's ire was obvious.

Tenchi's hand went to the back of his head in the familiar motion. "Wow, Washu, you really scared us there," he said with a good-natured laugh.

"Well, as I said, its bad timing, but I felt Ryoko ought to know that when Kagato was killed...again...our mental link was reestablished. And since she didn't put up her mental barrier, that means I could feel and hear everything she did!" the diminutive genius laughed.

"You...you...." Ryoko sputtered in her anger. "You little voyeur you!"

"Ooh, doing things you wouldn't want your mommy seeing?"

"Shut up! You little freak!"

Washu's laughter surrounded them, encouraging Ryoko's embarrassment to plunge further into anger. Tenchi stood by, hand on his head, laughing nervously.

"Heh heh...oh boy..." he murmured to himself. 

Washu's laughter eventually subsided, leaving Ryoko's growling the most prominent noise. "Anyway, Tenchi," Washu continued, "I thought it might be time to pull you out of Ryoko's head. Unless she had other plans..." 

"LISTEN, _MOM_," the cyan haired one began, putting extra sarcastic inflection on the second word.

"Hey, that sounds like a good idea!" cried Tenchi, hoping to distract Ryoko till he was safely out of harm's way. 

"Okay, now let me see..." the small, red haired woman mumbled incomprehensibly to herself. "Neural stabilizing field...accelerator...intersecting field...readjust that...ok. Now we just push this little button, and you're back in your own...uh-oh..."


End file.
